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Israeli threats fail to end detainees’ boycott of military courts

Palestinian women protest in the occupied West Bank city of Bethlehem to mark Palestinian Prisoners Day, 17 April.

Anne PaqActiveStills

Israeli occupation forces are threatening and beating Palestinian detainees in an attempt to pressure them to end their boycott of Israeli military courts.

Some have been forced to attend court sessions, prisoners rights group Addameer said in a statement marking Palestinian Prisoners Day on Tuesday.

It notes that Israel has arrested approximately 800,000 Palestinians and issued over 52,000 administrative detention orders since 1967.

The boycott, which started on 15 February, also includes lawyers and human rights organizations, as prisoners have urged them to take similar action as a way to delegitimize the Israeli military court system.

Prisoners said the boycott will last until Israel ends its practice of administrative detention – the widespread imprisonment of Palestinians without charge or trial that can be renewed indefinitely.

“The core of resisting the policy of administrative detention comes from boycotting the Israeli legal system,” the detainees mounting the action have stated.

Addameer, which provides legal representation to many prisoners, reaffirmed its “total support for the ongoing boycott of all court proceedings regarding administrative detention.”

Escalation

Israel is also threatening lawyers with punishment, including financial penalties, for complying with the boycott, according to Addameer. In the face of such suppression, Palestinian detainees announced their plan to increase their protests.

The escalation was set to take place last week, and included rejecting medicine, refusing to visit clinics and launching a hunger strike.

#BornAPrisoner

Given these facts, many took to Twitter with the hashtag #BornAPrisoner to express that whether Israel holds Palestinians in its jails, forces them to live under military occupation in the West Bank, or under its siege in the Gaza Strip, Palestinians are all born prisoners of Israel’s oppressive regime.

The rationale behind #BornaPrisoner is that it is a matter of fate for a Palestinian to become a prisoner. Whether that be behind bars, or simply bound in by the occupation, it is a simple fact of our reality that our lives are controlled by an external system. pic.twitter.com/vumYhIF12V

This video highlights some terms Palestinian prisoners have coined to describe Israel’s routine violations of their rights. They include “bosta,” their name for a vehicle used to transfer prisoners in tiny metal cages with their arms and legs chained – itself a form of brutal abuse.

If you want to know better how the Palestinian prisoners are living in the Israeli jails, you should know their special language by which they describe their life events! #BornaPrisonerpic.twitter.com/9yNmDb8W4G

The Palestinian BDS National Committee, the steering group for the boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign, tweeted that boycotting corporations involved in Israeli violations – including Hyundai, Caterpillar and Hewlett-Packard – is a way to support Palestinian prisoners.

“Israel has the dubious distinction of being the only country in the world that systematically prosecutes an estimated 500 to 700 children each year in military courts lacking fundamental fair trial rights,” according to Defense for Children International Palestine.

Last year, Minnesota representative Betty McCollum introduced a bill in Congress that would prohibit Israel from using any of the billions it receives annually in US military aid for the detention, torture and abuse of Palestinian children.

Hunger strike

Palestinian prisoner Amir Asad, 35, has been on hunger strike for more than sixty days to protest medical neglect in Israel’s Gilboa prison, local media reported.

Israeli prison authorities refuse to transfer Asad to a section of the prison for people with disabilities. Asad uses a wheelchair, making it especially difficult for him to use the bathroom.

Since his strike, Israel placed him in solitary confinement where is he forced to sleep on a mattress on the ground.

Asad, from the Galilee town of Kufr Kana, was arrested in 2012 and sentenced to six and a half years in prison. He is set to be released in June.

Comments

What is the matter with this country that is so wicked to its citizens? As a Jew I object most strongly to their Nazi behaviour. Where did they learn that from? Treat your citizens with respect please. This will rebound on you eventually.

Jews all over the world are speaking out against these abuses. Your voice is important because in addition to your status as a human being with a conscience, you are by virtue of ethnicity someone the Israeli state claims to defend through its criminal actions. As Jews publicly reject this nefarious association, Israel loses a key element in its propaganda offensive.